A recent book of essays by top economists suggests that many of the lessons of the 2008 financial crisis were ones that should have been learned long before the meltdown. The problem is that during good times, people forget.

What people think they know about war is as likely to come from watching war movies as from listening to the news or reading history—and in Hollywood, dramatic license often trumps historical accuracy.

The president’s second National Security Strategy articulates a belief in a peaceful, rules-based international order; it also reaffirms the fact that none of this can happen without the leadership of the United States.

With the existing world order under assault, Henry Kissinger still champions the traditional building blocks of the international system—sovereign states—even as he recognizes the rising influence of global markets and liberal values.

Earlier this month, embattled Lesotho Prime Minister Tom Thabane addressed a raucous crowd of supporters in the rural district of Mokhotlong. The trip was one of many in the final campaign push before the country’s upcoming special election, which was previously slated for 2017 and is now scheduled for February 28.

In December 2014, Brazil’s National Truth Commission completed what may be Latin America’s last major investigation into human rights abuses during the twentieth century. The report names names and calls for prosecutions, but whether its findings will lead to justice for the victims remains an open question.

Books & Reviews

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s vaunted “stability” has turned into spoliation. The methods he used to fix the corrupt, dysfunctional post-Soviet state have produced yet another corrupt, dysfunctional state—and unfortunately, there is no end to it in sight.

In the Magazine

What accounts for the continuity of racial inequality in a postracist America? The fact that an earlier era’s racism was built into the structure of various economic, social, and political institutions, so that even their race-neutral operations today produce imbalanced outcomes.